Television Better Endings

By now we have applied Better Endings as a principle to a wide range of topics, ranging from creative revisioning of movie endings and historical events to personal decisions, childhood events, and conversations. We have been finding that putting this principle into action in one domain can carry over onto others. Better Endings as a general principle can help us to be more mindful in day-to-day life as we realize we always have a choice, moment by moment, to proactively construct a path to the most desirable outcomes for all concerned. This allows us from our present vantage point to be cognizant of the past while attentive to where we wish to be heading from Here (and how to get there). If we go back to one of our earlier realizations from this blog, the Present is a doorway to alternate future ‘worlds’; so our choices Now can adjust the aperture or likelihoods for future conditions.

This week we return to a creatively playful theme of Television Better Endings. When I was in my teens I remember maybe the first time I ever thought of the principle of ‘better endings,’ when the television series The Fugitive ended. Finally Dr. Richard Kimball could get back to his life; the one-armed man who had ransacked his home and murdered his wife (for which he himself had been wrongly accused and imprisoned) was captured. Kimball’s innocence was affirmed; he was a free man. Well, that’s a good ending, if fairly predictable; it tied up loose ends of the story so the series could end. But I thought it would have been deviously fun if at the very end, after the newly accused man was safely behind bars, Richard Kimball might be walking along a private California beach near his home in the moonlight, and he would unscrew his own prosthetic arm and fling it into the sea!

So, Better Endings as a principle applied to television doesn’t necessarily have to be ethical; but still, what might my The Fugitive ending say about me (or, one you might write or ‘right’, about you)? Maybe I just saw Richard Kimball as a man of mystery to the end. For him to have finally, once and for all, outsmarted the deputy marshall Girard who had hounded his footsteps through the whole series would seem to have been justified, albeit in a twisted way. As a teen I suppose I wanted Kimball (or the actor David Jansen)’s freedom more than anything else.

Most of the television I watch these days is either informative (e.g. Through the Wormhole, The Universe, programs on Stonehenge, etc.), sci-fi oriented (re-runs of Star Trek NG), or historical. The only series I pay any attention to any more is The Big Bang Theory, which I have become rather addicted to since my last cross-country drive. I’ll have to play with these a bit to be able to offer any fine applications of Better Endings to such fare or others.

How about you? What television shows or series hold your attention these days, and why? How might they or a particular episode end ‘better’ or how might earlier TV stories or series have ended more to the liking of your creative re-imagining?

YOUR LIFE PATH is Available to Pre-order!

I invite you to cut and paste the link below into your url search bar to order my NEW book, Your Life Path. This book provides you with a full set of Life Path Mapping self-discovery Tools so you can Live Your Dream, Now! (Available from Amazon, Kindle, Barnes & Noble, and Indies.)

http://carrelbooks.com/titles/13365-9781631440786-your-life-path

Your Life Path Portfolio Toolkit

If you have purchased or have a library copy of my new book, Your Life Path, you may print out and use this Portfolio Toolkit (click on the link below), with workbook templates for all of the Tools provided in the book, free! (Cover art by Anne Lyon)

2018 — A Year of Exploring Your Life Themes

This year at Better Endings for Your Life Path we are exploring Life Themes. Life Themes are those recurring types of situations in your life that together weave the primary narrative threads of your Life Story. Each month we will explore one of twelve Life Themes commonly discovered with Life Path Mapping. See the menu tab “Monthly Topics” for the month’s Theme. I also encourage you to list your own Life Themes and explore them as they seem relevant for you to the monthly Themes.

Daily Posts

If you are just joining us at Better Endings, to catch up on what we're up to and how you can contribute, you may read the Category archives or click on Calendar dates to the left. Please Comment and Share your Stories or Guest Blog replies. FOLLOW to receive daily Better Endings by email. If you enjoy this site, please LIKE it on Facebook and Twitter and SHARE with your Friends! Linda

A New Year of Better Endings for YOUR LIFE PATH!

2017 is a year of HEROIC ADVENTURE with this blog, as we will explore THE ADVENTURE OF A LIFETIME. Every month we will focus on one phase--as a cycle within a larger cycle--of the Human Adventure, basing these phases on 12 of the stages Joseph Campbell has identified in the "Hero's Adventure Cycle," from THE HERO WITH A THOUSAND FACES, 1949. (See the Monthly Process menu tab for each month's theme and weekly process.)